CANON power shot sx240 HS.A brand new camera

The Canon PowerShot SX240 HS and SX260 HS are Canon's 2012 pocket super-zoom replacements for the PowerShot SX230 HS. The headline feature with pocket super-zooms is obviously the optical range and Canon has extended the reach of the PowerShot SX240 HS and SX260 HS to 20x with a new lens that's equivalent to 25-500mm. That puts them on a equal footing with Panasonic's market leading Lumix ZS20 / TZ30 and Sony's HX20V / HX30V.

Canon has resisted the opportunity to increase the resolution and has stuck with a 12.1 Megapixel back-illuminated CMOS sensor, but the image processor has been upgraded to the Digic 5. The best quality movie mode remains 1080p24, and the 3 inch LCD screen has the same diagonal size, but its aspect ratio has changed from 16:9 to 4:3, and the image stabilisation has been updated to Canon's new Intelligent IS system.

So far the SX240 HS and SX260 HS are identical, so what's the difference between the two models? It boils down to a single feature: the SX260 HS has a built-in GPS receiver whereas the SX240 HS does not. In regions which offer both models, this gives you the choice whether to go for GPS or not, but in other regions only one model may be available. For example in North America, only the GPS-equipped SX260 HS is on sale. Either way, in every other respect the SX240 HS and SX260 HS are identical, so all tests and results are applicable to both models. I got hold of the SX240 HS for review, so from this point on I'll refer to both models as the SX240 HS unless I'm explicitly talking about the GPS functions of the SX260 HS.

Having pretty much invented and then dominated the pocket super-zoom market, Panasonic's Latest Lumix models look set to continue the trend, but could the PowerShot SX240 HS be the first model from Canon to really challenge Panasonic's lead? To find out I've compared the PowerShot SX240 HS with both the 20x 14 Megapixel Lumix ZS20 / TZ30 and the slightly more affordable 16x 12 Megapixel Lumix ZS15 / TZ25.